Performances of keystone geometry micro-strip gas chambers

Abstract The performances of micro-strip gas chamber detectors with CF 4 counting gas have been tested with a 241 Am α source. The behaviour of the gain as a function of gas pressure, the dependence of the energy resolution on gas pressure and anode voltage, and the gain variation along the strip length due to the keystone geometry of the micro-strip pads are reported. An empirical response function to describe such a position dependence of the gain is proposed

Optimizing performances of CsI(Tl) crystals with a photodiode readout

Tests are described concerning the performances of CsI(Tl) crystals. Particular care was dedicated to the study of the light production and collection of the crystals, that appear to be significantly a⁄ected both by the choice of the wrapping materials and by the details of the binding technique. A functional relation between the light pulse height and the coupling of the crystal#photodiode system was deduced. Finally, the influence of this coupling on the energy resolution of the detector is discussed. ( 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved

Simplifying instanton corrections to N=4 SYM correlators

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits any use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited

Real-life effectiveness of tildrakizumab in chronic plaque psoriasis: A 52-week multicentre retrospective study—IL PSO (Italian landscape psoriasis)

Background: Tildrakizumab is a humanized monoclonal antibody that binds selectively the p19 subunit of interleukin-23. It is approved for treatment of moderate– severe chronic plaque psoriasis. Objectives: We conducted a 52-week retrospective study to assess the effectiveness and safety of tildrakizumab in a real-life setting. Methods: Our retrospective study included 237 consecutive adults with moderateto-severe plaque psoriasis, enrolled in 10 different Italian centres, treated with tildrakizumab up to Week 52. Patient characteristics, comorbidities, previous treatmentsand the PASI (Psoriasis Area and Severity Index) score at each visit (baseline, Week 16, Week 28 and Week 52) were retrieved from the electronic medical records. The percentages of patients achieving 75%, 90% and 100% (PASI 75, PASI 90 and PASI 100) improvement in PASI with respect to baseline PASI were registered. Results: At Week 52, 90.91%, 73.55% and 58.68% of patients achieved a PASI reduction ≥75% (PASI 75), PASI 90 and PASI 100, respectively. An absolute PASI≤2 was reached by 85.95% at Week 52. Compared with Phase 3 clinical trials, we observed similar rates of PASI 75/90 responses and higher percentages of patients achieving PASI 100. Patients who had not responded to previous biologic treatments and patients with cardio-metabolic comorbidities were significantly more likely to achieve PASI 100 at Week 28 and PASI 90 at Week 52. The higher body mass index did not interfere with the odds of reaching PASI 75/90/100 at each time point. No significant safety findings were recorded throughout the study, and none of the patients had to interrupt the treatment because of adverse events. Conclusion: Our data suggest that the efficacy of tildrakizumab for plaque psoriasis in ‘real-life’ clinical practice is comparable with Phase 3 clinical trials with higher percentages of patients achieving complete skin clearance (PASI 100) at Weeks 16, 28 and 52

A case of dengue type 3 virus infection imported from Africa to Italy, October 2009.

In October 2009, a traveller returning from Africa to Italy was hospitalised with symptoms suggestive of a haemorrhagic fever of unknown origin. The patient was immediately placed in a special biocontainment unit until laboratory investigations confirmed the infection to be caused by a dengue serotype 3 virus. This case reasserts the importance of returning travellers as sentinels of unknown outbreaks occurring in other countries, and highlights how the initial symptoms of dengue fever resemble those of other haemorrhagic fevers, hence the importance of prompt isolation of patients until a final diagnosis is reached

Effectiveness, Tolerability, and Drug Survival of Risankizumab in a Real-World Setting: A Three-Year Retrospective Multicenter Study—IL PSO (ITALIAN LANDSCAPE PSORIASIS)

Background: Risankizumab is a humanized monoclonal antibody that selectively inhibits interleukin-23. It has been approved for moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis and has shown efficacy and safety in clinical trials and real-world experiences. This study aimed to evaluate the long-term effectiveness, safety, and drug survival of risankizumab in a real-life setting. Materials and Methods: We included patients treated with risankizumab from January 2019 to February 2023. A Psoriasis Area and Severity Index score (PASI) was collected at weeks 0, 16, 28, 52, 104, and 156, when available. The occurrence of any adverse events was recorded at each visit. Results: We enrolled 1047 patients. At week 52, a ≥90% improvement in PASI was observed in 81.44% of patients, with a continuous improvement throughout the study (88.99% and 99.07% at weeks 104 and 156, respectively). After three years of treatment, all patients involving the scalp, palms/soles, and genitalia and 95% of patients with nail psoriasis achieved a complete or almost complete skin clearance. No significant safety findings were observed, and 90.73% of the patients were still on treatment after 36 months. Conclusions: This study supports the long-term effectiveness and safety of risankizumab in a real- world setting, even in patients involving difficult-to-treat areas

Brodalumab for the treatment of plaque psoriasis in a real-life setting: a 3 years multicenter retrospective study—IL PSO (Italian landscape psoriasis)

Introduction: Brodalumab is a monoclonal antibody that targets the subunit A of the interleukin-17A receptor (IL17RA), inhibiting the signaling of various isoforms of the IL-17 family. It has been approved for the treatment of moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis after being evaluated in three Phase-3 trials. However, long-term data on brodalumab in a real-life setting are still limited

Clinical-Genetic Features Influencing Disability in Spastic Paraplegia Type 4: A Cross-sectional Study by the Italian DAISY Network

Background and objectives: Hereditary spastic paraplegias (HSPs) are a group of inherited rare neurologic disorders characterized by length-dependent degeneration of the corticospinal tracts and dorsal columns, whose prominent clinical feature is represented by spastic gait. Spastic paraplegia type 4 (SPG4, SPAST-HSP) is the most common form. We present both clinical and molecular findings of a large cohort of patients, with the aim of (1) defining the clinical spectrum of SPAST-HSP in Italy; (2) describing their molecular features; and (3) assessing genotype-phenotype correlations to identify features associated with worse disability. Methods: A cross-sectional retrospective study with molecular and clinical data collected in an anonymized database was performed. Results: A total of 723 Italian patients with SPAST-HSP (58% men) from 316 families, with a median age at onset of 35 years, were included. Penetrance was 97.8%, with men showing higher Spastic Paraplegia Rating Scale (SPRS) scores (19.67 ± 12.58 vs 16.15 ± 12.61, p = 0.009). In 26.6% of patients with SPAST-HSP, we observed a complicated phenotype, mainly including intellectual disability (8%), polyneuropathy (6.7%), and cognitive decline (6.5%). Late-onset cases seemed to progress more rapidly, and patients with a longer disease course displayed a more severe neurologic disability, with higher SPATAX (3.61 ± 1.46 vs 2.71 ± 1.20, p < 0.001) and SPRS scores (22.63 ± 11.81 vs 12.40 ± 8.83, p < 0.001). Overall, 186 different variants in the SPAST gene were recorded, of which 48 were novel. Patients with SPAST-HSP harboring missense variants displayed intellectual disability (14.5% vs 4.4%, p < 0.001) more frequently, whereas patients with truncating variants presented more commonly cognitive decline (9.7% vs 2.6%, p = 0.001), cerebral atrophy (11.2% vs 3.4%, p = 0.003), lower limb spasticity (61.5% vs 44.5%), urinary symptoms (50.0% vs 31.3%, p < 0.001), and sensorimotor polyneuropathy (11.1% vs 1.1%, p < 0.001). Increasing disease duration (DD) and abnormal motor evoked potentials (MEPs) were also associated with increased likelihood of worse disability (SPATAX score>3). Discussion: The SPAST-HSP phenotypic spectrum in Italian patients confirms a predominantly pure form of HSP with mild-to-moderate disability in 75% of cases, and slight prevalence of men, who appeared more severely affected. Early-onset cases with intellectual disability were more frequent among patients carrying missense SPAST variants, whereas patients with truncating variants showed a more complicated disease. Both longer DD and altered MEPs are associated with worse disability

Rationale and design of an independent randomised controlled trial evaluating the effectiveness of aripiprazole or haloperidol in combination with clozapine for treatment-resistant schizophrenia

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>One third to two thirds of people with schizophrenia have persistent psychotic symptoms despite clozapine treatment. Under real-world circumstances, the need to provide effective therapeutic interventions to patients who do not have an optimal response to clozapine has been cited as the most common reason for simultaneously prescribing a second antipsychotic drug in combination treatment strategies. In a clinical area where the pressing need of providing therapeutic answers has progressively increased the occurrence of antipsychotic polypharmacy, despite the lack of robust evidence of its efficacy, we sought to implement a pre-planned protocol where two alternative therapeutic answers are systematically provided and evaluated within the context of a pragmatic, multicentre, independent randomised study.</p> <p>Methods/Design</p> <p>The principal clinical question to be answered by the present project is the relative efficacy and tolerability of combination treatment with clozapine plus aripiprazole compared with combination treatment with clozapine plus haloperidol in patients with an incomplete response to treatment with clozapine over an appropriate period of time. This project is a prospective, multicentre, randomized, parallel-group, superiority trial that follow patients over a period of 12 months. Withdrawal from allocated treatment within 3 months is the primary outcome.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>The implementation of the protocol presented here shows that it is possible to create a network of community psychiatric services that accept the idea of using their everyday clinical practice to produce randomised knowledge. The employed pragmatic attitude allowed to randomly allocate more than 100 individuals, which means that this study is the largest antipsychotic combination trial conducted so far in Western countries. We expect that the current project, by generating evidence on whether it is clinically useful to combine clozapine with aripiprazole rather than with haloperidol, provides physicians with a solid evidence base to be directly applied in the routine care of patients with schizophrenia.</p> <p>Trial Registration</p> <p><b>Clincaltrials.gov Identifier</b>: NCT00395915</p

Prospettive e potenzialità della digitalizzazione del settore forestale in Italia

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) play a key role for improving the implementation of sustainable forest management at local, regional, and global level. The ICT potential to easily exploit a wider and more up-to-date set of information on the economic, environmental, and so- cial value of forests is of relevant help for the daily work of technicians, land owners, and companies in boosting the efficiency and effectiveness of forest management. The concept of “Precision Forestry” (PF) was developed from the early 2000s, as a branch of precision farming or precision agriculture. PF includes the use of ICT, remote and proximal sensing technologies, and other devices to coordinate and control several processes on a spatial scale (“Precision”) for monitoring, planning, and managing forest resources (“Forestry”). The aim of this monography is to collect and describe some of the most important PF experiences applied or potential- ly useful for the Italian forestry sector. It may represent a reference guide for the stakeholders, such as forest owners, professional technicians, public administrators, and policy makers. The book includes eleven chapters reviewing the main tech- nological tools available in the Italian context and the most recent advances of ICT in forestry, also focusing on the strengths and weaknesses of their practical implementation. The opportunities and challenges of implementing PF meth- ods, practices and technologies are also discussed. In the first two chapters the precision forestry concept and its historical development are introduced. In the third chap- ter some basic elements of ICT, GIS, Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), remote/proximal sensing, and related technologies which are essential for a better compre- hension of PF applications are recalled. In chapter 4 recent advances in large scale forest inventories with a focus on mapping and on the spatial estimation of forest variables integrating field surveys and multisource re- motely sensed data are described. Current advancements in the acquisition of field information including Terrestrial La- ser Scanning (TLS), new digital dendrometers, tree-talkers, terrestrial cameras, and APP for portable devices such as smartphones or tablets for dendrometric tree measures and new citizen science applications to support quantitative and qualitative spatial estimation of forest variables over large areas (i.e., forest health, fuel types) are also presented. The chapter ends up with the description of some experiences in the implementation of Forest Information Systems in Italy to provide a simple open-access to such new generation of spatial forest information. In chapter 5 PF tools, instruments, and technologies to sup- port sustainable forest management are illustrated. APPs developed to acquire field plots data to simulate manage- ment operations, the application of photogrammetric tech- nologies from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and TLS data for monitoring with high-spatial scale forest monitoring and for acquiring indicators at single tree level are presented. A de- tailed description of new user-friendly tools for forest roadplanning, design and construction, as well as forest opera- tion planning is also included. Precision forest tree farming (with particular reference to poplar cultivation), useful to promote and increase the prof- itability and sustainability of forest plantations within the Italian context is described in chapter 6. The innovation and enhancement within the supply chain of wood plantations (from planting to harvesting, including monitoring and identification of stress) by soil proximal sensing techniques, Early Warning Systems, and specific software are highlight- ed. Considering the even higher market demands, promoted by the large-scale planting programs for climate changes mit- igation and the demands for propagation material for en- vironmental recovery, innovative techniques and methods supported by ICT in the forest nursery sector are described in chapter 7. In chapter 8 available technologies related to precision har- vesting are analyzed and described taking into consideration the wood chain efficiency, by means of improved commu- nications between the owner/buyer and operators as well as among machineries used in forest operations, health and safety of forest operators, environmental impacts mitigation and recovery, and operators training. Advanced communi- cation systems and sensors for the exchange of data and information between machines, machine-equipments and/or machine-operators, teleoperations and automation are also described. Chapters 9 and 10 are related to wood products traceabil- ity, timber quality assessment as well as the technologies for the optimization of wood transformation processes. The concepts of wood product traceability and tracing, togeth- er with latest digital technologies for the identification and tracking of the logs (i.e., fingerprinting and RFID), are de- tailly reported. Chapter 11 is finally dedicated to the relationship between the EU policy framework and the digitalization process in both agricultural and forestry sectors. The book summarizes, under a proactive and homogeneous framework, PF methods, tools and technologies in relation with the digital transition of the Italian forestry sectors. The authors hope this book will be useful for improving the implementation of sustainable forest management practic- es at all levels in Italy, providing a comprehensive review useful for policy makers, technicians, forestry owners and students